Earth's tilt affects climate change: Study

New York: In a first, researchers have discovered a connection between the Earth's tilt, called obliquity, that shifts every 41,000 years, and the movement of a low pressure band of clouds that is the Earth's largest source of heat and moisture - the Intertropical Convergence Zone, or ITCZ.

This finding showed that the Earth's tilt plays a much larger part in ITCZ migration than previously thought, which, the study said, would enable climate scientists to better predict extreme weather events.

For the study, the researchers analyzed data from the past 282,000 years. "I took the data and put it through a mathematical prism so I could look at the patterns and that is where we see the obliquity cycle, that 41,000-year cycle," said Kristine DeLong, associate professor at Louisiana State University in the US.

Historically, the collapse of the Mayan civilization and several Chinese dynasties have been linked to persistent droughts associated with the ITCZ. This new information is critical to understanding global climate and sustainable human socioeconomic development, the researchers said.